A day before Congress committee meeting Solons told: Stop Cha-cha

One day before the meeting of the congressional committee on charter amendments, labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno called on the members of the House of Representatives to stop efforts to amend the 1987 Constitution, saying further advances in these efforts will be met with protests.


“We are calling on the country’s legislators to stop efforts to amend the 1987 Constitution. Judging from their thrust, such efforts will only make the country’s basic law worse for workers and poor people,” said Elmer “Bong” Labog, KMU chairperson.


“The Aquino government is trying to sell the country at rock-bottom rates to allegedly make us competitive amidst the severe global crisis. This will cause greater dispossession, poverty and suffering for the Filipino workers and people,” he added.


“It is deplorable that the Aquino government is not even entertaining a rethinking of its pro-market so-called development framework despite the latter’s proven failure not only in the country but in the world,” he said.


The HOR Committee on Constitutional Amendments is set to meet tomorrow, Oct. 11, to deliberate on House Concurrent Resolution No. 10 which seeks to amend the economic provisions in the Constitution.


On the agenda are the following amendments: (1) removal of the 60%-40% equity limitations on foreign investors, (2) removal of the exclusive control and management by Filipinos in companies with foreign equities, (3) expansion of foreign investors’ role in exploring, developing and utilizing the country’s natural resources, (4) allowing foreign ownership of industrial lands, (5) allowing foreign investment in the media industry, (6) liberalizing the practice of profession, (7) allowing foreign investments in tertiary education, and (8) expansion of the 25 years plus 25 years land lease agreement.


“The Aquino government is trying to prettify Cha-cha by saying that it’s only the economic provisions which will be amended. But it is precisely this drive to change the Charter’s economic provisions which we have consistently opposed in the past,” Labog said.

“While we do not discount the possibility that the term extension of incumbent government officials will be smuggled in at some point, attempts to revise the economic provisions of the Constitution already deserve to be opposed,” he added.


“We vow to meet further advances in efforts to amend the economic provisions of the Constitution with bigger protests,” he said. Elmer “Bong” Labog, KMU Chairperson